People's stories told through the objects they cherish

Raymie: Teaspoon that holds memories

Raymie Watson
Artist
Cushendall, County Antrim

Favourite thing: Teaspoon

So this teaspoon, it’s a kind of an old teaspoon but whenever my children — who are now 18 and 16 — when they were still toddlers, I fed them their breakfast every morning and their dinner.

I would have used this spoon to feed them because there’s these wee golden feather shapes — there were once golden feather shapes on it and they’re now worn away. So I used to say to them, to help them to eat, to make them eat better, I would say: “Come on now, we’ll get the wee golden spoon”. Because then it was like this special thing to eat with the special spoon.

And then when I fed them with an ordinary spoon sometimes, they would ask for the wee golden spoon, so I would then go and get this and feed them their porridge or feed them their stew or whatever it was they were eating.

Every time I see that spoon it reminds me of that.

“One of the few things I made a point of taking out of the house was this spoon”

And about 7 years ago I split up with my ex and one of the very few things that I made a point of taking out of the house was this spoon.

So, I still have it and I still use it every day. And every day when we get it out, it reminds me of when they were kids, which was a very special time in my life.

So where did this spoon come from?

Raymie: Somebody had it in Nam up their arse for like 10 years. (laughs) When I was in my sister’s house in Newry, I was feeding the kids there and we used this spoon and I asked her if we could have it. I don’t know where she got it. And I took it from her because I said the kids liked it. I think that’s where it came from.

It’s in the drawer. It just gets used with everything else, like. We don’t treat it like, you know, an heirloom or anything!

“I’ve other things… but they don’t have the same human connection that this does”

But whenever you contacted and wanted something special, I had various things I could have chosen from. Some of them maybe a lot more sexy than this. But I kind of thought, “Yeah, what was the thing that actually, really, meant something to me?” It’s funny how something like that, something so simple, you know… Because I’ve other things that you could say, “Oh yeah, that’s kind of impressive”. But they don’t have the same human connection that this does, for me.